The Secret Place By Dennis Lee
Ilse Marseau
Through their book and Bonus CD, Simple Prayer, you will be gently guided through a 60-day challenge with scriptures, daily prayers, healing prayers, and space for personal journal notes, transforming the perception of prayer from a burden to a joyful experience in your secret place. You will also get their new two-part audio CD set, Discovering the Secret Place.
Most believers know the importance of Jesus' words in John 15: "Abide in Me." But at the end of each day we look back and feel that we were distant from His presence, and failed to yield the Godly fruit He desires. In Abiding in the Secret Place, Drs. Dennis and Jen Clark help everyday believers create a constant place of close encounters with God.
Drs. Dennis and Jen Clark have spent years cultivating their daily communion with the Lord and trained thousands of everyday Christians to do the same. Having struggled, learned, and grown in this practice, they are able to help you create a constant place of secret encounters with God.
Tunnel Tower is in some ways my most fanciful piece. Inspired by the same small building at the entrance to the Holland Tunnel that inspired Two Stories with Porch (for Robert Cobuzio), I chose this time to focus on the fantasy elements of the building: the resemblance of the building to a tower or castle and the scaffolding with its ladders, blinking colored lights, and neon lettering. I wanted the scaffolding to be big and playful, and to do this I had to keep the building low. My problem was how to make a one-story structure feel like a tower: tower as secret place, as signal-sender, as lookout, as dungeon. I thought of White Castle and White Tower hamburger stands, which suggest one-story, miniature castles. Detail was what did it: turrets and crenolations.
The building came to represent for me a fortress: a small, warm, secret, personal place with a tough skin. The scaffold and sign mounted over it was about a revelation, a poignant beacon, a public calling across unfathomable distances. I saw the scaffold with its electricity as a fragile and complex nervous system rising out of the fortress, and its appearance marked a public celebration of private fantasy and feelings.
The scaffolding not only supports but even broadcasts the word TUNNEL, suggesting the brave surfacing of a vast underground network, a subterranean circulatory system, the revelation of something powerful and submerged; the making vulnerable of that unknown entity. One is forced to wonder about the secret source of energy, about the unseen, the unknown, and to feel its power.
My garden provides me a peaceful sanctuary, a sunny patch to grow food, a shady spot to sit in nature, outdoor seating to safely gather with friends and family, the secret place I go when I am sad, and so much more than I could possibly put into words. Now, maybe more than ever, I feel fortunate to have birdsong and jasmine aroma coming in through my windows, plus fresh garden produce and flavorful herbs waiting to be picked right outside my door.
Planted containers full of flowering annuals/perennials, culinary herbs, or a small tree for shade also contribute a lot to outdoor entertaining areas by bringing plants closer in. A grouping of a few pots together or a collection of containers placed around the perimeter make fresh herbs and flowers easier to pick and enjoy, brings fragrant plants closer to seating areas, and adds color wherever you want it.
The secret place is something that prophetic people speak of in a way that it almost seems mystical. The secret place is also the perfect place to run to in the midst of this current coronavirus pandemic. Many countries are locked down, and South Africa, where we are right now, is in a severe lockdown. While you are home, why not spend time in the prayer closet? Jesus is calling us to intimacy.
George was born September 16, 1948, in Madison, to Floyd and Isabelle (Hamm) Dennis. He graduated from Central-University High School in 1966. Born a city kid, George spoke of spending his childhood in the secret places of the Wisconsin State Capitol, and loved the Vilas Zoo, UW Arboretum and the Madison lakes. He married Patricia Staley in 1967 and together they had two sons, Joseph and Michael. He later met Sandra Sobkowiak; they married in 1990 and had one son, Daniel.
The short answer is no. But trust me, the difference between a pounded chicken breast and a not-pounded breast is night and day. I promise your chicken parmesan will be much better if you take the time to pound the breasts.
Heat a large saute pan on high heat and add about half an inch of vegetable oil. Carefully place the breaded chicken cutlets into the oil using tongs. Add as many as you can into your pan without crowding them.
Cook chicken breasts until golden brown. Using tongs turn them over and saute the other side until golden brown (2-3 minutes per side). I usually use corn oil to pan-fry the chicken, but olive oil will also work.
The secret to making perfect Chicken Parmesan is using enough tomato sauce. Sauce under and sauce on top is key to making chicken parmesan your whole family will love. Use my homemade spaghetti sauce recipe for the best chicken parmesan.
Hello Chef,
I would like some advice on preparing chicken parm. I have made a hundred times, but I would like to make the whole dish ahead and reheat the next day. I would cook the chicken and layer the cheese and sauce, but do I cook it then and then refrigerate or just layer and not cook before refrigerating.
Please Help, thanks
Maryann
You want to cook the chicken ahead of time and refrigerate without sauce or cheese. Reheat at 350 for 20 minutes, then add the heated sauce on top and the cheese and bake until the cheese is fully melted (7-10 minutes. Putting it all together the night before will not yield a good chicken parm.
My name is Chef Dennis Littley, creator and owner of Ask Chef Dennis Productions. As a classically trained chef with 40+ years of experience in the kitchen, I share my time-tested recipes, knowledge, and chef tips to help you create easy-to-make restaurant-quality meals in your home kitchen.
I came to know Jesus as Lord and Saviour in 1994 through an Evangelical ministry bible study conducted by Christian Business Ministries Committee (my testimony can be found at www.surrender.ca). I quickly recognized that not only was I ill prepared to live a Godly life without some serious discipleship, but I also had no clue what it meant to be a Godly husband.
For the next five years I immersed myself in the Word of God and became quite involved with various ministries. In 1999, I felt a leading to pray for a wife and went on Christian Matchmaker.com (it is no longer operating) and met Angelina who was living with her daughter in London, Ontario at the time. She was working as a business manager at a car dealership and was very ready to get married. She had had much exposure to Christianity but had not experienced true conversion as of yet. When we met it was evident that her heart was well prepared to fall in love with Jesus.
We were married in my backyard in Ottawa in July 1999 and our adventure as a couple began. I recall encouraging her to spend time getting to know the Lord by reading His Word. She had been so conditioned by the world to work and strive for success that she asked me if I was sure it was OK to spend hours with the Lord and not working! After assuring her that the Lord would be well pleased, she began her journey and grew and matured in Him very quickly.
In 2001 we were operating a Christian Retreat called Abundant Blessings in the foothills of the Laurentian Mountains in Val des Bois, Quebec, Canada. Angelina had established a prayer closet, a "secret place" in one of the bedrooms to meet with our Lord and spend time in His Presence. Also, at this time I was licensed as a pastor with CFCM (Canadian Fellowship of Churches and Ministries). Through word of mouth many people came and were refreshed by spending time in worship, bible study and alone in His presence. We were thrilled to be part of this hidden work of the Lord.
Of course, Quebec's very Catholic heritage was all around us including a beautiful Grotto on our property which I had covered with a white cross signifying that Mary was behind Jesus 100%. I thought this strategy would appease both Catholics and Protestants.
In the fall of 2001 my very close and dear friend Hugh (www.catholicbridge.com) asked if I would play bass for him in a Polish Catholic church in Toronto. Up until that point we had ministered many times together and I thought it was a show of unity between Catholic and Evangelical brothers. This time however was different as this opportunity was actually in a Catholic church. The last time I had ministered in a Catholic church was many years before with worship leader Marcel Dion. It was an Easter mass and I thought it would be my last. I had been given a defamatory documentary movie about the Catholic Church by a well meaning Evangelical brother and had made a decision to completely leave the Catholic Church.
As I expressed to Dave my doctrinal difficulties with the Catholic perspective on different issues, he began to send me lengthy apologetic emails defending the Catholic church. I sometimes wondered how he was making the time to do this! We now know he also was praying and had others praying for us including Father Brian Christie (this whole process was the impetus for Dave's Evangelical friendly Catholic website www.Catholicbridge.com).
One of the main doctrinal disputes was the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. This made me particularly uneasy as I was celebrating it symbolically as a pastor. Angelina and I went into the prayer closet and prayed a simple prayer. "Lord, we do not want to miss out on anything you have for your children." I was intellectually confused and added one more prayer which I did not share with Angelina. I said to the Lord, "please show me through my wife if you are really present."
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